Pretty legit start to the training week. Building off of the snatch sequence last Friday, I went with a bodyweight pressing workout to work on muscle endurance at heavy load. I finished the WOD in 14:11, and it was a fight for much of it. The floor presses took about 5 minutes, the push presses a little longer than that, and the jerks just less than 4. The push presses were by far the most difficult because the triceps and shoulders are already smoked form the floor press. I had to do sets of 2 and 3 the whole time at 185#. By the time I got to the jerks I was in just go mode. Sets of 5 all the way and no pause at the bottom of the movement. Going directly up from the rebound and not stopping was the only way I was getting 5 reps in. Great training right here.

In the afternoon I met up with Denny and company for what amounted to grunt work. In Auburn there is a famous hill that runners, hikers, and mountain bikers frequent called "training hill trail." It's a mile of 20% + climbing with only 2 flat portions to take the burn away. Denny wanted to hike it with some extra weight so I obliged. 60# on my back, 30 minutes, and a world of pain later we were at the top. OUCH. Everything in my lower body was done, and we still had to get back down the mountain. Check out a clip of the hike below.

Doing elements like this in training is so important because it reminds you how fine the line is between completion and failure. It woulda been no big thing to set the bag down for 30 seconds, but none of us did. Everyone was hurting more than they expected but found a way to keep going. I was counting to 100 over and over again to keep my mind off the pain. Do these WODs infrequently because they beat up your joints, but often enough to keep you mentally tough. It carries over to a lot of other areas of life that seem harder than they are.